Only By A Few Seconds

To the person that reviewed and said this:

homosexual you retard hetro is for straight

Read the story description and author's notes, please. Don't flame people because you can't figure out a flamingly heterosexual bromance is. It's a play on words; Shepard and Kaidan become very close friends in this fic and nothing will stand between their friendship. Something told me that somebody would not read the a/ns at the top of the pages and would think that the fic was m/m. Please, read the a/ns that people write. Your review was deleted because it had nothing to do with my story. Please do not call people retards on the internet until you have your facts straight. Have a nice day.

To the rest of you: I know you're hiding. Come out, come out, wherever you are :D


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“Dare ya’ to spit over the side,” Ashley chuckled. The elevator doors ground open, the rusty metal flaking with the movement.

“You know,” Shepard smiled, “if it wasn’t likely that we’d be ambushed by geth, I’d one-up you and piss over the side.”

The elevator began a rapid descent to the dig site. Shepard closed his eyes for a moment and breathed deeply, enjoying the lukewarm breeze from the elevator while he could. The sulfuric smell of Therum was stronger down here. He glanced over at the chuckling Lieutenant.

“Yeah,” Kaidan mused, “it’d be pretty bad to be caught by the geth with your junk hanging out of your armor.”

“Dead on, LT,” Ash replied, “those geth snipers can hit very small targets at great distances.”

The elevator stopped and Shepard turned to smirk at her.

“You wanna’ see, Chief?” he snorted, motioning to the lower clasp of his armor.

“No thanks,” she rolled her eyes, “I’ll save you the embarrassment.”

The Lieutenant tried not to laugh outright, his face turning red with the effort. Shepard turned to nudge him on the arm and opened his mouth to speak, but the sound of geth drones interrupted him. Simultaneously the Commander and Lieutenant attacked the drones, taking them out in a matter of seconds. Shepard turned to Kaidan and beamed.

“Yeah!” he shouted, high-fiving the other man, “that’s how it’s done, man!” Shepard wheeled around and pointed at Williams. “Now, where were you? Were you staring at our asses?”

“No sir,” Ash narrowed her eyes, “your asses were directly in my line of fire.”

“Our fine asses,” Shepard gave the Chief a knowing look then glanced over at Kaidan.

She simply shook her head and followed the officers into the next elevator. It began its descent to the lowest level of the ruins, shuddering on the way down. The shuddering increased until the elevator came to a shrieking halt a few feet from the bottom. Cautiously, the ground team looked around for hostiles then silently slipped out of the elevator.

“Hello!” a female voice shouted, “Can somebody help me? Anybody?”

Beyond the debris, Shepard saw an enormous room blocked by an equally large kinetic barrier. He cautiously rounded the corner.

“Please!” the voice continued, “I am trapped! I need help!”

The Commander looked up to see an asari, bound and levitating in the middle of the blocked room.

“Shhh…” he quietly called out, “there are geth everywhere and you’re in danger. Are you Dr. T’soni?”

“Yes,” she replied, “oh, thank the goddess. I did not think anyone would come looking for me.”

“Don’t worry, Miss,” Shepard nodded, “we’re Marines. I’m a Spectre. We’ll get you out of there.” He winked at her then turned to his Lieutenant, a broad grin on his face. “Come on, let’s see what we can find to get her out of there.”

The men walked off, leaving a frazzled Gunnery Chief behind. Shaking her head, Ash looked up at the woman behind the curtain.

All this for one asari.

“Any idea how we can get past this barrier?” she asked.

“Um,” Liara looked to the side in embarrassment, “I activated it, knowing it would keep me safe. But the deactivation mechanism is inside the chamber. That’s the tricky part.”

The Chief nodded in recognition and looked around the immediate area for possible clues. She jumped when she heard gunfire in the direction her superiors had gone. Cursing, Ash drew her sniper rifle and honed in on the location of the enemy. Behind a distant rock, a geth sniper lurked, waiting to off one of her comrades.

“Not today, bud,” Ash hissed and pulled the trigger.

The geth went down in one hit.

Ash looked through her scope once more to try to pick off another enemy. She caught sight of the LT, his figure bathed in blue light. Violently, he threw a geth trooper against the wall; its neck snapped at an odd angle on impact. The Chief shuddered at the display. It was beautiful yet unnerving. She didn’t want to see what that would do to another human.

“Is there a biotic among you?” Liara’s voice brought Ash out of her officer appreciation.

“Yeah,” the Chief replaced her sniper rifle and leveled Liara with a glare. “Stay away from him.”

“I was just wondering,” Liara replied, her eyes wide, “I felt someone activate dark energy and there was a Krogan here earlier.”

Ash blinked in realization. There was a Krogan somewhere in the ruins. She had to reunite with her team immediately. The Chief sprinted off, leaving a confused Liara behind.


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“That’s a damn big gun,” Shepard murmured as he stared at the mining laser.

“Yes, sir,” Kaidan nodded.

“I want to shoot it,” the Commander walked over to the controls and began to push random buttons. The soldier had no clue what he was doing.

“Yeah,” Kaidan nodded in agreement, “it would be pretty cool to watch it go off.”

Shepard turned around, grinning broadly.

“That’s what she said,” the Commander laughed.

Kaidan chuckled and approached the laser’s controls. Shepard removed his hands from the console, knowing that the Sentinel could figure out how to fire the oversized weapon.

“Hey guys!” Ash ran up to her distracted officers, “there’s a Kro...”

A beam of light shot out of the laser, completely destroying a portion of nearby rock.

The Commander and Lieutenant exchanged awed looks.

“Do it again,” Shepard murmured, his eyes transfixed on where the ground used to be.

He snickered and glanced over at Ash. Sidling up to her, the Commander leaned down and put his mouth near her ear.

“Do it again, Kaidan,” he whispered, “Ooooo, do it again.”

The Chief visibly stiffened, her face turning bright red. Shepard quickly darted away from the incensed woman.

“There is a Krogan nearby,” Ash stamped her foot, “and you two want to fire a laser instead!”

Shepard winced and glanced around, looking around the mine for an excuse. The glimmer of white Prothean tiles shone out against the freshly blasted rock.

“We were looking for a way to get past the curtain,” the Commander replied, pointing at the area that the mining laser’s blast uncovered. “Now let’s go rescue an asari,” he smiled.

Ash shook her head in disbelief and silently followed the Commander and Lieutenant. Part of her dreaded to see what they’d do next.


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“I hate to admit it, but I am only one-hundred and six,” Liara looked to the side in shame.

“You sure look good for your age,” Kaidan crooned as he looked Liara up and down. He looked away long enough to catch the gaze of everyone in the comm room. “I mean, you don’t look that old,” he quickly corrected himself.

Thankfully, Shepard chose to ignore the Lieutenant’s indiscretion. Kaidan lost himself in embarrassment as the Commander addressed Liara; he looked up in time to see them go into a trance of some sort. Liara’s eyes turned black, her irises silver. Her pupils fixated on something that wasn’t present. It was among the creepiest things the Lieutenant had seen in his life.

After a moment, Liara fell out of her trance.

“Did you see anything?” Shepard asked.

“The beacon on Eden Prime must have been badly damaged,” Liara shook her head, “the vision is fragmented, incomplete. The information contained in the beacon was meant for a Prothean mind. To be able to go through what you did completely unscathed is truly remarkable. You must be very strong willed, Commander.”

Silence pervaded the room.

After a long pause, Liara blinked. Why was everyone so quiet? They must have been waiting for her to say something.

“There could be other beacons out there,” she supplied, “Saren could have the missing pieces. If we can find it…” The asari trailed off as she began to feel faint.

“When was the last time you ate or slept?” Kaidan interjected, “Dr. Chakwas should have a look at you.”

“Yeah, good plan,” Shepard gently grabbed Liara in order to steady her. “Kaidan, would you see her to the medbay? The rest of you are dismissed.”

The Lieutenant put his arm around Liara and led her out of the comm room, unaware of Ash’s heated glare. He helped the scientist navigate the stairs to the medbay, introduced her to Dr. Chakwas and only left when he was sure that she was comfortable.

Kaidan’s shoulders slumped as soon as the medbay’s doors closed; it had been a long day and it was only half over. Striding over to his console, the Lieutenant sighed and began to write the Alliance’s report. Shepard was sure to come by when he finished reporting to the Council. Kaidan methodically sorted through the happenings on Therum, mentally compartmentalizing each and every detail. He would write down the details that were relevant to the mission; the rest was filed away in its own appropriate mental box.

“So, what’s your opinion on the last mission?” Shepard’s face popped out from around the other side of Kaidan’s console.

The Lieutenant yelped and cursed, his biotic nerve endings boiling below the surface of his skin in defense. Shepard grinned broadly and stepped out from his hiding place.

“You said a bad word, Lieutenant,” he smiled, “I think that’s the first time I’ve heard you cuss.”

Kaidan exhaled and closed his eyes. It wasn’t often that someone was able to sneak up on him. Though admittedly, if anyone could, it would be the highly trained Shepard.

“So,” Shepard leaned casually against the wall, “my question?”

“Dr. T’soni?” Kaidan replied, “She seems like a sweet girl. Easy on the eyes.”

“Just remember, I saw her first,” Shepard quipped. He crossed his arms and looked over at his subordinate.

“Only by a few seconds, sir,” Kaidan met Shepard’s gaze.

For a moment, the Commander and Lieutenant stood in silence, carefully choosing their next words.

“Dibs,” came out of their mouths in unison.

They narrowed their eyes at each other.

“Dibs,” they repeated.

Well, that was unexpected.

“Diiiiiiiiibs,” the Commander and Lieutenant repeated again, drawing out the word and stopping at the same time.

“This isn’t going to work,” Shepard huffed.

“No Sir,” Kaidan shook his head and sat down.

The Commander followed suit and sat as well, the newly manufactured seat groaning in protest. He crossed his arms and stared at the medbay in careful thought. So they both wanted Liara. Asari were known to be sexually permissive. They both rescued her from a certain death. Maybe she would have them both.

One thing was for certain: he wasn’t going to let a woman get in between him and Kaidan.

“Tell you what,” Shepard grinned, “I’ll race you. The first one to bed her gets to have her. The winner gets to decide if they want to share.”

The Lieutenant’s eyebrows shot up at Shepard’s declaration.

“That’s not very gentlemanly,” he murmured, “I mean, she is a person with feelings and I wouldn’t want to just use her for sex.”

“I’m not going to deceive her,” Shepard said, “I don’t want a relationship. If she does, I’ll be honest with her. I’m not a complete ass.”

“Good to know,” Kaidan replied. He leaned forward and stared in the direction of the medbay. What did he want with Liara?

It was a silly question. They’d only just met, but part of the Lieutenant was extremely attracted to the sweet, innocent asari. He didn’t want a relationship though. What did that leave?

His eyes widened as he realized that he wanted what Shepard wanted. No, he didn’t want to use Liara for sex, but he had to admit that was what it sounded like. Since when did he ever want to have sex simply for the sake of doing it?

“Stop that,” Shepard’s voice interrupted his thoughts, “you’re thinking too hard about something.”

“No, I…” Kaidan trailed off then sighed. “Yeah, you’re right.”

The Commander stared straight ahead, his eyes unfocused.

“Bury it,” he murmured, “that’s what I do and it’s always worked well for me.”

Kaidan’s mouth drew into a frown. He only buried things after he figured them out and he could easily disagree with Shepard’s advice.

Neither of them noticed the asari that approached them to talk.

“A beej would be a nice thank-you,” Shepard commented, “since we saved her life and all.”

“Are you going to suggest that?” Kaidan snorted.

“Nope,” the Commander replied, “if Liara wants to do it, she’ll do it. But a beej would really be nice.”

“A beej is always nice sir,” Kaidan chuckled.

They laughed and Liara slowly backed away. What was this ‘beej’? If Shepard and Kaidan wanted something, they only needed to ask. Perhaps it was customary to provide a beej without being asked. The scholar was perplexed. She could use the extranet to figure it out, but it was likely that her search history would be passed down to the Commander. No, she had to ask someone for the knowledge. Thus satisfied, she entered the elevator that led to the engineering level.

Liara would ask Chief Williams to inform her about this beej.